Just Breathe
by Arcadya
Summary: TV Prompt Challenge. "The UnSub had a knife, ready to slit the six year old’s throat. In his other hand, he had a gun. It’s dark muzzle pointing at JJ." No summary, just an excerpt...


**Okay, *stretches typing fingers* no more of the fluff. This authors trying on some badness...short badness...one-shot badness, which is usually a bit difficult for me...so here goes....**

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**TV Prompt Challenge  
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**X Files:** One Breath

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Nobody breathed.

Nobody moved.

Nobody even dared to speak, to blink or to swallow.

The UnSub had his latest victim in front of him, using the little girl as a human shield, a waist down shield. But still a shield. They had a perfect head-shot, even a perfect chest shot, but no one was about to take it.

The UnSub had a knife, ready to slit the six year old's throat. In his other hand, he had a gun. It's dark muzzle pointing at JJ.

Nobody breathed, the UnSub was highly strung. The team had been canvassing the neighborhood. They were just doing routine investigations, nothing fancy; they barely had a working profile. They were just out and about doing some preliminary work. No one thought they were going to stumble into the UnSub's house. He had been accommodating at first, if a little nervous. Rossi had attributed it to JJ's beauty. The man had seemed the type to be intimidated by beautiful women. Thinking back now, he realized that should have been his first sign.

It was his fault JJ was in this position. If had been on alert, a little more aware, this wouldn't have happened, and JJ wouldn't be facing down the barrel of a gun. The team tried to keep her out of these types of confrontations.

As soon as the little girl had exited the room she was being held in, and tried to make a break for JJ, the UnSub had reacted. He had grabbed her quickly, choking her while whipping out the gun from between the cushions of the couch.

Rossi and JJ had barely had time to draw their own weapons before they were locked in this stalemate.

While he held them at bay with his gun, he had pulled the knife out of his back pocket, exchanging the choking throat grip for the knife hold.

They had remained motionless after that for about ten minutes. Rossi's cell phone had started ringing soon after. When he hadn't answered, JJ's started, and within five minutes. Emily and Morgan had entered the house, and were part of the standoff too.

The UnSub never wavered his grip on the gun, and the knife occasionally trembled slightly on the girl's throat. She whimpered slightly, a small line of blood appearing on her throat. Finally, someone found their voice.

"Don't move honey." Emily had whispered, focused on the child.

The child's eyes moved to where Emily was standing. She had been held captive by this man for three days now. She was the seventh in a long line of mutilated and discarded girls. She tried to nod, but immediately realized her mistake, her eyes filled with tears. But she refused to look anywhere but at Emily.

JJ felt like an idiot. She was frozen by this stupid gun. They'd had training about these kinds of situations. She shouldn't have been so paralyzed by the appearance of a gun. Hell, she killed a man before, with a gun! She knew how these things worked, and she was in the FBI for god's sake! She was also disappointed in herself, she hadn't even thought to try and reassure the child.

The UnSub wouldn't stop staring at her either. It was disconcerting. She was usually surrounding by the team when she had to confront criminals. And right now, she was surrounded by most of her team, but she did not feel safe. One bullet and everything was over, one bullet and she would never see Will or Henry again. One bullet and Henry lost his mother. She tried to calm herself down. It was so not going to help for her to start crying. Then the child would really lose it.

Emily could feel the change in JJ. She was going to cry. Oh no! That would be bad. The UnSub wouldn't be able to handle that. She and Morgan had been postulating possible reasons for the UnSub's victim choice. They reckoned that he couldn't interact with woman his own age and that was why he went for children, little girls. They were easy to control and their emotions were easily satiated.

Morgan noticed the sudden extra tenseness in Emily. Something vital had changed.

Rossi noticed too, he looked for the possible cause. JJ's gun was shaking slightly. Oh. Bad.

Emily glanced toward JJ, then Morgan. They were going to have to get the UnSub's attention of JJ. She couldn't handle this much longer. She was going to break. Emily hoped she could keep it together for a little bit longer. But she knew her friend. She was running worse-case scenarios, she was Henry-focused. It was going to be bad.

Emily started sliding her feet forward, Morgan mimicked her.

"My name's Emily, what's yours?" She addressed the child.

The child tried to answer but was cut off by the UnSub.

"Her name's Delilah." The child looked up at him confused. He had obviously renamed her.

"Nice to meet you, Delilah." Emily greeted the girl, giving her a tender smile.

"Who's your friend?" She asked, still addressing the child.

Again the UnSub answered, "Samson."

_Original_, she thought.

"It's nice to meet you Samson." She moved forward again. Soon she would be close enough to move in front of JJ. Rossi and Morgan were flanking her, ready to intercede and protect when necessary.

Samson nodded and his hand, the one wielding the gun, shifted. He was still pointing it at JJ but it was leaning toward the floor.

Emily was racking her brains trying to remember the specific details of Samson and Delilah. Something about money and hair, and stone pillars falling and crushing a thousand people. Really helpful there, she scolded herself.

"I like your hair." She tried, hoping she didn't sound too much like an idiot.

Which is exactly what Morgan thought she sounded like, her voice had gone quite girly, not like Prentiss at all!

The UnSub approved.

"Thank you." The hand holding the knife moved away from the girl and he ran his hand through is hair.

The little girl, _Delilah_, was frozen in shock. It hadn't occurred to her to run.

Rossi started motioning for the girl to come towards him, but she hesitated. She was afraid of men still. The bad man had taken her. Why should this man be different?

"Do you do anything special with it?" Emily asked, trying to hold his focus while she moved closer still. The UnSub stopped to think, his eyes reaching the ceiling as he reflected. Emily leaned forward slightly; she reached out her hand to the girl.

The girl suddenly unfroze, letting Emily grasp her hand and pull her behind her body. Morgan and Rossi closed in.

By this point the UnSub's gun was pointing somewhere about the area of Emily's shin. He was still thinking about his hair.

Emily started to back away, shuffling the girl behind her and toward JJ.

JJ was having a crisis of conscience. _What was she doing?_

The UnSub suddenly realized what was happening. He gave a yell and tried to lunge for Emily and the little girl. Morgan and Rossi quickly intercepted him, grabbing him and his gun before he managed to pull the trigger. As the three men went down, Emily picked up the little girl and raced from the room.

JJ remained standing, completely unaware, yet completely aware, of everything that was occurring.

Half an hour later, Hotch and Reid were overseeing the clean up procedures. Not that a lot needed to be cleaned up, but jurisdictions and news coverage needed to be addressed. Plus there was the informing of 'Delilah's' family.

JJ was still standing in that house. The guys weren't sure how to reach her, and Emily was busy taking care of the little girl. She didn't seem to want to release her hand.

Morgan left Rossi, Reid and Hotch with JJ; he went outside to find Prentiss.

"She's still not talking. She hasn't moved." He told her.

Emily was sitting quietly next to the girl. "This is Aimee." She said, introducing the girl formerly known as 'Delilah' to Derek.

Derek crouched down, "It's a pleasure to meet you." He extended a hand, and she shook it, giggling.

"Where's the blonde lady?" Aimee asked.

"She's still inside honey." Morgan answered.

"Is she still scared?" Aimee asked again.

"Yeah honey. I think so." Emily answered.

"Can we go make her feel better?" Aimee tugged at Emily's hand trying to get down off the hood of the police car.

"Um..." _How was she supposed to answer that question?_ She shot Derek a look. He shrugged. _It couldn't hurt could it?_

"Okay, sweetie. Let's go." Emily replied, picking Aimee up and carrying her inside the UnSub's house.

Rossi, Reid and Hotch looked at the door opening in surprise, especially seeing that Emily had brought the little girl with her.

Aimee struggled to be let down. Once she was on the floor she hesitantly moved toward JJ. When she reached her, barely coming up to JJ's waist, she slowly hugged her legs.

"It's okay...it's okay to be scared." She said, still hugging JJ.

Emily tried not to cry, she could feel the tears welling. Morgan felt the emotional bubble try to rise up in his chest. He kept it a bay though, now wasn't the time.

Slowly, JJ seemed to come back to herself. As if by its own accord her hand reached down to caress Aimee's head.

"It's okay to be scared. My Mommy says that 'cause, it down't matter if you get scared, just that you keep going. Like when there's a monster in my closet. It's okay to be scared, I just have to keep opening the closet with Mommy or Daddy around until the monster leaves."

She tugged on JJ's hand, "The monster always leaves, Mommy says. But it starts with taking a big breath!"

She started trying to pull JJ away from her spot in the UnSub's lounge room.

"You take a big breath and go 'it's okay to be scared'. But you've got to move now." Aimee turned around and spoke to Emily, "sometimes you need a friend to help you. Like Mary Doll. She helps me too, when Mommy and Daddy are asleep."

Emily smiled through her tears. She walked over to JJ and grabbed her other hand.

"One breath, JJ. Just start with something little. Just one breath...and then you can call Henry." At the sound of Henry's name, JJ seemed to breathe in a huge sigh. Her feet started moving, and Aimee and Emily helped her walk out of that house.

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**Always nice to have a happy ending, I've never written an unhappy ending I've just realized. Perhaps I should try my hand at that next time? Any takers?**

**Arc  
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